


Ships Love their Engineers

by Rinari7



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Crack, Episode Tag, F/F, Gen, Other, Season 6 Episode 5 Alice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-10
Updated: 2016-08-10
Packaged: 2018-08-07 22:05:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7731481
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rinari7/pseuds/Rinari7
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tom Paris is hardly an engineer, so he enlists B'Elanna's help to get the alien shuttlecraft up and running again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ships Love their Engineers

**Author's Note:**

> Because I lowkey ship B'Elanna and anything technological. So when I saw that "Alice" episode... I couldn't resist.
> 
> Ignore pretty much the entire plot after Voyager acquiring the ship.

“Come _on_ , Alice. You have to stop blowing through parts.” B’Elanna shook her head as she climbed into the pilot seat. It was the only remotely comfortable place on the small craft. “You’re of no use to Voyager in the state that you’re in.”  
  
Exasperated with how long repairs were taking, Tom had practically begged her to come down and take a look. Surveying the small interior of the vessel from the pilot's seat, she passed her fingers over the panel in front of her and shook her head. “I can’t believe I’m talking to a ship named after a girl Tom used to _lust_ after. I need to access the schematics. _Why_ is your database so empty?”

 

 _Right. There aren’t any weapons or piloting controls here either._ On an impulse, she leaned back and activated the neurogenic interface.

 

It was strange, being so intimately connected with a piece of machinery, for the first split second, and then it felt like the most natural thing in the world. She had always understood engines and circuitry.

“You are not Tom Paris.” The voice sounded like it was coming from right next to her ear, but when she turned her head, of course she only saw empty air. It was female, an almost… beguiling voice. “Are you a pilot?”

 _It’s highly advanced technology. I shouldn’t be surprised it talks back._ The weapons array, the thrusters, the sensors, all felt like they were a part of her, like she could activate them just as easily as she could blink. _Impressive systems._

“No, I’m an engineer,” she murmured. “I need to access your schematics. Your full schematics. Repairs and maintenance will go a lot faster if we have them.”

 

It took a moment, and then she felt the rest of the ship, too, could see and practically run her hands along every power conduit and switch, every single inch of the vessel.

Sleek, efficient design… maybe she could see why Tom was so crazy this craft now, though she knew that what had first attracted him was the outer hull, like those 20th century mechanical vehicles he was so fond of. Typical male.

“Gorgeous.” It was just a whisper, to herself.

“Thank you.” B’Elanna almost would have called the voice matter-of-fact if it wasn’t for that slightly coy undertone.

 

Mentally, she continued scanning the ship. “That relay’s been installed wrong. It’s sapping too much energy. No wonder you’re blowing through so many power cells. And the injectors aren’t configured right, either… The deuterium ratio is too high. The engines will run hot, which means the cooling system has to be set higher, which consumes even more power. It looks like some of your circuitry has degraded and shorted out.”  
  
Quickly, B’Elanna pulled up the ship’s programming as well. The neurogenic interface made the code immediately comprehensible, though the language wasn’t one she was otherwise familiar with. _Check, check, check… interesting targeting algorithm… what is that?_ ”There’s some kind of virus in the navigation systems.” They _had_ gotten the ship from a junkyard, so she wasn’t really surprised, but this was worse than most.  
  
“And Tom forgot to install a transformer there… he might be a great pilot but he doesn’t know much about repairing ships. You’re a ‘hot mess,’ to use his phrasing. Well, we’ll get you running more smoothly in no time.”

 

“No!” The shriek echoed painfully in her ear. “I feel fine. I like how I run.”

B’Elanna growled. “Do NOT do that again. And you won’t lose any efficiency.” Mentally reviewing all the planned modifications, she hesitated a moment before breaking the link, and added, “I promise.”

 

Talking to technology wasn’t uncommon for her, but reassuring it was. With a shake of her head, she reached for the shuttle hatch. It jammed, and shocked her, heavily and repeatedly, the voltage likely high enough to paralyze a human.

“You _petaQ!_ ” Hardly imaginative, but nothing else came to mind as she fell backwards and groped for her engineering kit, hearts racing. The inner door panel came off easily. There was no discernible reason for the malfunction, but disabling the locking mechanism wasn’t hard. Once her commbadge had a signal again B’Elanna had herself beamed straight to sickbay, where the doctor praised her Klingon side for her survival, _again_.

 

The next few days were… trying, to say the least. Her nerves were frayed, and her hackles rose every time she even passed by the shuttle bay, and the tips of her fingers were numb from the amount of electricity transferred from Alice to her. Half of her repairs and improvements she had to re-do the next day, because someone kept on taking out the new parts or shorting them out or misaligning the injectors again. She called the spacecraft many things, practicing the Klingon art of crafting insults. Tom and Harry wisely kept their distance, as did her engineering staff, insofar as they could.

 

Especially tricky had been removing that virus. Creating a way for one of Voyager’s diagnostic computers to interface with the shuttle’s systems had been a feat in and of itself, and then the malicious program had done its best to elude her, hopping from navigation to weapons controls to the main processing core and finally hiding as benign schematics in the database before B’Elanna managed to obliterate it.

 

But finally—with the hatch propped open this time—she sat down in the cockpit again, took a deep breath, and initialized the interface.

“You modified me!” It was a terrible screech.

B’Elanna shouted right back. “Shut up!”

It took effort, but she finally forced a connection—to the accompaniment of a searing pain in her temples. But everything checked out. With a deep breath, she activated the engines.

 

The shuttle lit up and purred, and B’Elanna examined every square inch yet again, with a little less discomfort this time.

“Finally.” She sighed, and slumped in the chair, and leaned her head forward, the metal of the neurogenic interface mechanism digging into her cranial ridges. “Everything looks good.”

 

Alice cleared her throat. “I… seem to owe you an apology. I’m not used to this configuration, but… it feels good. I feel… better.” The engines revved a little, and B’Elanna rolled her eyes and shut them off.

“Damn right you owe me an apology.” Her temples still throbbed, but her headache had lessened decidedly.

“It’s a shame you’re not a pilot.” Was that… flirtatious? “You know me better than I knew myself.”

 

“That’s my job.” _Now_ the stupid temperamental thing was happy. It could have been happier a lot sooner if it had just cooperated.

“Have you ever tried to pilot a ship?”

“No, I’m happy with my engines.” She should get to sleep now. But it was so much easier to just sit here. Just a few more minutes.

“You should try. I think you would be good at it.”

“Thanks, but I’m _fine_.”

“Try.” Alice was insistent, her voice taking on an edge B’Elanna didn’t like.

“Watch your tone. I can still dismantle you if I want to.”

 

Alice's tone turned placating, almost pleading. “It’s just that… this is so intimate. I’d prefer having someone pilot me who knows me, someone who can appreciate me.”

“Trust me, Tom _appreciates_ you.” B’Elanna snorted.

“Not like you do.”

 

“I’m flattered.” B’Elanna let out an exhausted ghost of a laugh. Being angry was too much effort right now. Besides, it was just a ship. “I’ll be back tomorrow to run some last-minute diagnostics and checks before your first test flight.”

“I’m not just a ship.”

“Pardon me?”

“Is your doctor _just_ a hologram?”

B’Elanna grit her teeth. “You’ve been _reading_ my _mind_?”

“That is what I am designed to do.” She sounded so _logical_. Like the infuriating ex-Borg.

“You’re designed to _listen_ to _commands_! Not invade people’s privacy!”

“I… was not aware there was…” The ship fell silent for a moment. “It is in my nature to bond as fully with my operator as possible.”

“You’ll have a multiple different operators now, so you’ll have to get used to it.” B’Elanna spoke curtly. At least ships didn’t take offense at your tone.

“I… can switch operators. But it does not come so easily. I am not designed for it.”

 _Another thing to fix._ “I’ll see what I can do.”

“Thank you.” B’Elanna heard, practically felt, the disappointment.

“Trust me. You won’t know the difference afterwards.”

“I will trust you.”

B’Elanna swallowed.

 

“This… test flight you mentioned. Will you be on it?” Alice’s voice wavered slightly.

“No, sorry.”

“But you will come and interface with me again? You’ll be responsible for my maintenance?”

“I’m responsible for the maintenance of everything on this ship.” B’Elanna straightened again, and sighed. “And I expect you to run smoothly now. No more blowing out power cells or shorting out circuits. We only have a limited supply. Blow any more and you’ll be stuck in the shuttle bay for months until we can spare the energy to replicate the necessary parts.”

“I understand.” The spacecraft sounded almost subdued.

 

B’Elanna couldn’t help mentally caressing the conduits one last time. After a moment of wistful silence—what she wouldn’t give to have this sort of interface for _Voyager_ —and with a shake of her head, B’Elanna cut off the connection. “Good night, Alice.”

As the shuttle bay doors slid shut behind her, she thought she heard a quiet “Good night” in response.

**Author's Note:**

> I know this isn't my best work. *cringe* It's just a crack-y thing that hopefully some people still enjoyed.


End file.
